France-Portugal, crucial duel in the UEFA index

And the results of the first two days of the European group stages do not help much: only PSG won their two confrontations, while Marseille lost twice in C1. On the C3 side, Rennes has a victory and a draw, Nantes and Monaco a success and a defeat. Finally, in C4, Nice chained two draws.

Before the third day, from Tuesday, France, with 60.081 points, points far behind the untouchable quartet England / Spain / Italy / Germany, while Portugal has 53.382 points and the Netherlands 49.300.

Objective three direct qualifiers in C1 in 2024

For this « country coefficient » calculated on the current season and the four previous ones, the French representatives can still widen the gap since they are still all in the running, while Portugal only has four clubs out of six after the elimination of Gil Vicente and Vitoria Guimaraes in C4. Because a slip to sixth place at the end of the season would result in French clubs losing a direct ticket to the group stage of the Europa League.

In this hypothesis, the club which would finish fifth in Ligue 1 in the spring of 2023 would qualify for the less prestigious Europa League Conference, as the sixth in the championship. The fourth would continue to be directly qualified for the Europa League groups, and the first three for the Champions League (with preliminary rounds for the third).

And for Ligue 1, the stakes will be even higher from 2024-2025: in the new 36-team format of the Champions League, the fifth country on the UEFA index will benefit from three direct qualifiers for the hens of the C1, plus a fourth club playing the preliminary rounds.